Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Alicia I love this movie so much

TrueJoshNight Truly Dreadful Film

Erica Derrick By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Cristi_Ciopron One of those '60s tiny budget, really bad Sci Fi movies, where the 'actors' perform unlikely scenes as if they are under sedatives or worse, while an ethereal, disturbing score floods everything, the atmosphere is unwillingly eerie; like other Italian flicks of the very same trend, it has a crazy enough, if silly, storyline, a certain freedom and inventiveness, perhaps a good sense of the show—it has scenes on Mars, a vile, perhaps even depraved seductress, an unapproachable but ultimately kind genius, etc.. Now compare that to a classic Bert Gordon—not to mention the even sillier Buchanan—and you'll see for yourself what I mean—the Italian Sci Fi looks a bit more lively, less morose; though, of course, still goofy rubbish.BATTLE OF THE WORLDS is goofy Sci—Fi, derisory and unremarkable, aimed at kids, where silliness competes with clumsiness and witlessness—a knockout cocktail; a team of scientists faces the extragalactic threat.An object from another galaxy approaches the Earth; its trajectory indicates a rational activity. It is guided by a rational force, and the UFOs don't take time to appear as from behind this object. And in these circumstances, the fate of the humanity lies in the hands of a group of scientists headed by the grumpy oldster I have already mentioned. After a while, the flick becomes all about this zany old—timer and his antics.I admit not having recognized the presumptive Gemma in this flick; have you? Some '60s goofy Sci—Fi movies, derisory and lame, had nonetheless a bit of charm, a kind of fun, an appeal; you can call them flicks, perhaps they are no more than footage, goofy Sci—Fi footage. Each connoisseur has his own selection in this genre, as each knows his dish. Anyway, for fans of a certain kind of goofy Sci Fi, BATTLE OF THE WORLDS, mediocre rubbish from the '60s, provides some fun.

dbborroughs For me this film is an old friend. Its a film I've seen countless times thanks to showing on the Late Late Show while I was growing up.Its been forever in the bargain bins. The film is about a giant asteroid that comes close to earth and our attempts to find out why its sending out ships to attack us. As a film its an okay time killer its not bad. Its not great but its definitely not bad. Its certainly better than many of the space opera films that followed in its wake through the 60's and early 70's. One of the reasons I think the film works, and is the reason I will watch the film again and again is the presence of Claude Rains as the mad genius who wants to know whats going on so he can save the world. Its a force of nature performance that allows him to really tear the roof off and go for it. Certainly it more than a little over done but some how seeing the great man being out of character is a great deal of fun. I really like the film and recommend it to those with a love of science fiction

MartinHafer On IMDb, a score of 4.0 is pretty poor, but STILL I think this is wild overrating this film. IL PIANETA DEGLI UOMINI SPENTI ("Battle of the Worlds") is a truly terrible sci-fi film with nothing to recommend it. A small part of the rottenness of this movie isn't the fault of the film makers. The DVD I just watched had one of the worst prints I have ever seen. The color was almost 100% drained out of the film. While there were some patches of the film that had very dull and muted color, other parts looked like the film was originally shot in black & white--it was that faded. However, the ravages of time cannot explain away most of the awfulness that was this film!For some inexplicable reason (it had to be money or they were holding a family member hostage), the well-respected British/American actor Claude Rains was featured in this film. This is pretty sad, as his part in the film was rather annoying and one-dimensional. He played a brilliant professor who seemed to have super-human knowledge and could use calculus to pretty much explain EVERYTHING. In addition, he had the social skills of a hyena and spent most of the film yelling at everyone and acting very, very superior. He didn't play a person, really, but more of a caricature. The plot involves some planet that just shows up in the solar system. Amazingly, no one seemed to spot it until it practically was ready to seemingly collide with the Earth. Now here's the stupid part. When the governments on Earth realize the collision is coming, they don't want to tell anyone because it will cause panic! What part of "giant planet colliding with the Earth" don't they understand?! If this IS inevitable, let the people panic--they're all going to die anyway in a few days! In the meantime, we are treated by lots of ground-breaking special effects such as the space station on Mars as well as the high tech rocket ships. I once saw similar effects--back when I had "Major Matt Mason" toys when I was a kid. I know this dates me, but for those in the 40-50 age range, you probably know what I am talking about here. In other words, these things all looked like very, very cheap toys...at best. Heck, in some cases, you can see the strings on the rockets and the explosions and lasers were so very obviously drawn in later. The folks at studios like American-International or Ed Wood would have laughed at the amateurness of the special effects.In addition to looking craptastic, the plot was amazingly dull and I had a hard time staying awake to see the movie to completion. The movie, in essence, consisted of toys flying about, Claude Rains overacting and embarrassing himself and a plot so amazingly uninteresting I just wanted to see everything collide and end the film...as soon as possible!Dull, dull, dull...and stupid. This one clearly has earned the lowest rating of 1.

Steve Nyland (Squonkamatic) Antonio Margheriti's Italian Spaghetti Space Operas are some of the most interesting science fiction from the 1960s. Starting with SPACE MEN (or ASSIGNMENT: OUTER SPACE) and culminating with the brilliantly mod GAMMA ONE QUADROLIGY, Margheriti helped to shape the ultimate form of the genre -- Kubrick's 2001: A SPACE ODYSSEY -- and gave it a truly modern ring (for the time) that was only bettered by the Soviet era science fiction like PLANETA BUR and MECHA NEVSTRACHU. A journeyman filmmaker with a background in production design, Margheriti was not as visionary in his approach as contemporary Mario Bava, who's PLANET OF THE VAMPIRES remains the most impressive example of Spaghetti Science Fiction, but Margheriti had perhaps a more populist approach to his work that still endears forty-plus years later. His use of models, miniatures and pyrotechnics alone would have earned him a very respectable place in the annals of the genre by themselves.BATTLE OF THE WORLDS is his second trip into the galaxy for entertainment, and compared to the previous year's ASSIGNMENT: OUTER SPACE, this movie is almost a quantum leap forward in terms of ambitions for his plot, characters and action sequences. And I suspect that as is the case with ASSIGNMENT: OUTER SPACE a great deal of the critical responses this movie has accumulated ("Atsa one-a lousy meataball") has to do with the really crummy surviving prints of the film, or rather the surviving home video transfers available on public domain oriented DVD collections. BATTLE OF THE WORLDS was certainly a much more impressive experience when shown in it's correct original widescreen ratio, probably 2:35:1 Techniscope by the looks of the pan and scanning going on to condense the film for small screen. The color on the transfers -- which are likely traceable to the same early 1980s transfer to VHS -- are almost uniformly rotted nearly to sepia in spots, with plenty of surface noise & jumbled damage to individual frames. What most people are reviewing is the DVD they saw, not the film itself.I must admit that the first time I saw this movie I despised it, didn't understand it, and shelved the poor video for a few years until I sold it before realizing who director Anthony Dawson was. Now seeing it again a few years older and wiser I still must come clean and say I don't understand the plot, how the story gets from A to B to C, and have actually been paying attention just to figure it all out. From what I can gather, Earth finds itself under assault from a wandering "planet" that has come from another galaxy (a story idea Margheriti would later re-visit in his Gamma One project), ostensibly to conquer Earth as a new home for it's passengers. Only crazed astronomer/mathematician Claude Raines understands the phenomenon as what it really is: An attack, and urges the united Earth government bodies to act before it is too late.In pursuit of that end there are lots of frantic rocket ship battles, near collisions, big Margheriti explosions and of course a location shoot at a local power plant or electrical substation standing in for a spaceport. There is a base on Mars, guys in pressure suits doing stuff on the surface of the invading planet, a cute little puppy dog and even some romance. Including, oddly, old man Raines almost openly having a thing for his 20 year old assistant with her dark, fluttering eyelashes. Raines is easily the most impressive aspect of the film but mostly because he emotes such vigor in his role, and seems to be enjoying it so much, that you can't help but be charmed by the effort. Even if it's hard to understand what he's on about half the time. But like a Spaghetti Western what makes it "work" is the collection of individual moments that make up the film, some of which are actually very well done.5/10: Look fast for Spaghetti Western hero Giuliano Gemma in one of his first screen roles, and yes: We NEED a better print, badly.